I had forgotten exactly how manic feels. I took 40 mg of prednisone today. I've got some walking pneumonia, damn cold, and it was horribly complicated by asthma making me cough so hard I was vomiting and unable to stop my head from splitting with pain. The great thing about prednisone is I'm breathing very comfortably right now. I am supposed to take 40 mg every day for the next five days and let my body just relax. I'm supposed to let my inflammation die down and let my lungs heal. I know it's important. The horrible thing about prednisone is that my mental state is not okay. It's not my own. And I'm going to blog it because I want to remember this - I want to remember the reality of how it feels to be manic.
(autocorrect would like to turn prednisone into prisoner. i believe this is accurate.)
Sometimes I romanticize it in my head. It's easier than remembering just how fucking painful it can be. It's easier remembering the good parts - for example, if you've ever wished you could add 6 hours to your day - there you go! Mania can do that for you. Cheerfully you can sleep 2 hours and be awake 22. If you want to generate amazing, awesome amounts of writing, tirelessly, even about the rawest emotional topics - yep! Mania is your best friend. If you want a libido in overdrive? You got it partner!
Here's the awesome parts about mania.
1) LIMITLESS ENERGY!
2) Weight loss
3) LIMITLESS ENERGY!
4) Being able to talk at 350 words per second
5) Typing about 80% faster without a noticeable reduction in accuracy
6) LIMITLESS ENERGY!
7) Libido of endless energy
8) Lack of emotional stifling
Here's the shitty awful ugly truth about the rest of it.
1) My body will not sit still.
1.5) My brain will NOT stop talking. It will not stop presenting me with music and color and flash and bang and bad memories and great memories and they all bleed together like confetti on the street after a parade. After the piss and the rains.
2) I cannot sleep. And I know, because I'm only manic right now and it's been more than 3 years since I've experienced this, that this is a vicious fucking cycle. There is a very high likelihood that I will be even MORE manic tomorrow because I slept from 11:30 - 1:30 while tossing and turning and sweating and nightmarish dreaming.
3) What's that cat doing? I hear that cat. Also the fan makes a distinct click every 4.5 seconds when it hits the rotation part of its cycle and starts oscillating backwards.
4) Who invented oscillation? Did they know that it was going to make such a horrible clicking sound?
5) But if I turn off the fan I'm going to get way too hot. I get really hot. I'm hot.
6) Fuck I'm out of Ativan. I've not needed it in over three years. I have one and a half mg. It's left over from a dental procedure. I saved it on the off chance I would need it. Okay. I'll take it.
7) Panic. Because I remember that I wanted to feed the guinea pig some fresh veggies before I went to bed and instead he only has pellets and hay and will he die? That would be my fault.
7) Panic is that someone's footsteps in the hall? But the girls are with their dad until Thursday. Nobody could be in the hall is that someone's footsteps in the hall and am I going to see a shadow? A shadow doesn't stop when you ask it to, do I have to see a shadow?
8) The best color I can describe is fuchsia. It's garish and bright in your face pink. It's relentless. It's ever-present. It fades in the wash but you won't notice it, you just won't even have to notice because in your mind it's going to be just as pink just as bright just as confrontational. It's bold, fuchsia. It's going to fucking get you noticed and you know it's going to get you noticed because you asked it to and you demanded it and you're in charge of this show. It's you, it's yours. It's bright pink baby.
9) Wait. PVCs. I hate PVCs. Is my heart going to just get tired of the pulsing, the throbbing too fast? Is it going to stop?
10) Should I maybe just re-read some books I've read before and wait calmly for this to pass?
11) Maybe I should cruise Amazon and buy a movie or two to calm my brain. No that's not going to work, I'd put a movie on and then I'd decide it's a really good idea to go for a walk. It's 2:30 in the morning. I'm not going for a walk at 2:30 in the morning.
11) If I can't go for a walk could I maybe clean the kitchen? If I clean the kitchen I'm going to start coughing out my lungs and wake up Aaron and Tara and worry them. Maybe I'll plot cleaning the kitchen. Maybe I'll make some new recipes, write a few poems, and make a grocery list.
11) If I can't do that because I can't settle down maybe I should play the Sims and pretend everything is okay and watch my Sims sleep. Or eat. Or watch TV. Or swim in the ocean and sometimes get hit by lightning. Why do the Sims swim when they can die so easily from it?
11) The sun will come up soon I just know it only sunrise is four hours away. Will I be alone in the dark for four hours trying to quiet this quiet that stop the oscillation stop the overhead spinning?
12) Now I'm crying. I'm sobbing hysterically because I can't sleep.
13) Because I can't sleep I'm crying.
14) Because I'm crying I can't sleep.
15) That fan. That clicking. The clicking of my fingers on the keyboard. The darkness is surrounding me because my husband is asleep next to me and I can't bring myself to keep waking him and begging him to help me try to get to sleep.
16) My legs my legs they won't sit still.
16) The shaking in my hands it is a little less now? Maybe it's slowing. Maybe my wrists won't clack anymore when they shiver. Maybe I'm typing slower? I might be typing slower.
17) Oscillation is an amazing word.
18) Bagels are amazing too.
19) Cats are soft. Cats. George has curled up next to me and is purring with all his might. He knows I cannot sleep and he knows I need his reassurance and his company.
20) The veins in my fingers are becoming more visible as I get older. They're blushing blue through my skin, which is sunworn. I forget sunscreen. I think I might get skin cancer, but I think most people of my generation are going to anyway. Should I start putting sunscreen on my hands? And yet I love the lines on them - the wrinkledips at the knuckle are beautiful, especially reflected in the light of the computer screen in a dark room. I feel as though I may be made of bronze and bone.
21) I don't have to let myself feel this way.
And I don't. The last dose of Ativan I own has kicked in - it takes about 7 minutes from the time I take it. I will call the doctor in the morning and explain that prednisone is unkind. I will ask for Ativan to get through this time, because I know that I need to take the steroid and let my lungs recouperate. But mania hurts. That many thoughts at once, all at once, they hurt.
And there is Aaron next to me. He woke up and got the Ativan for me. He went back to sleep. He is beautifully unconcerned about long-term problems for me because he knows I've got this. I'm in control of my bipolar, at least for now - and the fact that I will ask for medicine when I need it is why I'll stay in control of it. It doesn't have to be my master - I can master it. Good sleep. Less stress. Ask for help when I need it. I don't believe for a moment that I would allow myself to spiral out of control. I would go back on the lithium in a heartbeat because my life is too awesome and too incredible to have to be feeling mania all the time.
I love to watch him sleep. It's relaxing, you know?
No comments:
Post a Comment